CONTENTS Dreaming of the Moon Early Flyer Sending Men to the Moon Astronaut Armstrong The Apollo Program Focus on Apollo 11 Spacecraft Countdown Begins Moon Landing Focus on Walking on the Moon Earth Bound Life After Apollo Mission Accomplished Timeline Glossary Find Out More Index
DREAMING OF THE MOON On July 20 1969 American astronaut Neil Armstrong paused on the bottom rung of his Lunar Module ladder and looked down The surface appears to be very very fine grained as you get close to it it’s almost like a powder he reported over his helmet radio Then as around 600 million people watched from their television sets on Earth Armstrong lowered his left foot onto the Moon’s surface He had just become the first human in history to step onto another world His following words would be forever printed in the history books beside his name That’s one small step for a man one giant leap for mankind
Lunar stories Before scientists began working to get astronauts into space science fiction writers made up stories about people being towed to the Moon by geese or flown aboard hot-air balloons In his 1865 book From the Earth to the Moon Jules Verne described three men traveling to the Moon on a rocket This was a remarkable prediction of the Apollo 11 Moon mission that took place 84 years later
TOP PLACE IN SPACE Sending three astronauts to the Moon aboard Apollo 11 was one of humanity’s greatest accomplishments However just 12 years earlier the United States did not even have the technology to launch a rocket into space At that time it was losing a race to space against its rival the Soviet Union Only an ambitious plan like a Moon landing would get the United States on top All it had to do was design and build the spacecraft and train astronauts to fly in them Neil Armstrong became the most famous of these astronauts
